COMING UP

PLACES & TRACES

A guided rickshaw video tour through the center of Berlin

In the PLACES & TRACES format, MS Schrittmacher deeply infiltrates the public sphere in order to discover locations in the Berlin metropolis where crisis lives and its effects are felt. Locations that constantly leave their traces in our society, public discussion and our private lives. Traces that are generated from our era’s trend towards crisis or that produce crisis. Eight such locations will be joined in to a tour through Berlin’s center that will change or augment the perspective on these sites. The guided rickshaw video tour invites Berlin’s inhabitants and visitors to confront the individual locations and lets them see how they are prone to crisis.

In PLACES & TRACES, the visitor risks a look behind the curtain at the end of every stop. After being supplied with relevant facts by the rickshaw guide, a performance video, which he can look at a tablet in the rickshaw, tells him an additional story about the respective location. A gaze or comment, that makes the knowledge about this location somewhat more comprehensive. Sometimes with, and sometimes without, a wink.

Starting in June 2015

Supported by the Ruling Mayor of Berlin with additional support of DINAMIX.

Ten Days, Five Formats on the Legacy and Lasting Influence of Anita Berber

Most people today have only heard of Anita Berber, dance icon of the 1920′s, in connection with her scandalous life. But Anita Berber was more than that. She redefined the art of her age like no other and challenged the viewing habits of her audiences. In her dances, Anita Berber, who also acted in many important films of her day, mercilessly exposed the innermost depths of her soul. Tender and eternally committed to the moment, she granted her spectators intimate insights into her own personal world of morbidity and unfathomable depths. In ANTA BERBER – RETRO/PERSPECTIVE, MS Schrittmacher set out to explore the legacy and lasting influence of Anita Berber in five different formats presented over the course of ten days at Anita Berber’s place of death, the Bethanien in Berlin-Kreuzberg – former hospital and now centre for the arts. Funded by TANZFONDS ERBE – An initiative by the German Federal Cultural Foundation

There have always been crises. They come and go, but every time they also change social contexts. And thus our thinking and behavior. The world economic crisis, the oil crisis and the current crisis that we now just simply call “the crisis”. What causes this perpetuum mobile of crisis? In their new production, GOLD, the MS Schrittmacher company takes on the greed for gold – and thus wealth and power. In the process, MS Schrittmacher makes clear that greed is what is unique – not the crisis. The greed for gold accelerates us – and our times. The spiral of greed rotates faster and faster, turns order into chaos, fascinates us and draws us in. With its sense for tragic humor and humorous tragedy, the company investigates the greed virus’ ominous effects on human coexistence and social systems.

While the people in the wealthier parts of Europe are retreating from the public sphere into the private realm due to a threat that is still abstract to them, the very concrete threat to people’s existence in the crisis-riddled European South is driving others onto the streets. Both reactions have a certain helplessness in common. Two reactions, two dancers, two choreographers. One Europe, one stage, one piece. In VON INNEN HERAUS DRAUSSEN, the retreat from public space confronts its recapture. Within the sound cosmos created by the two dancers’ movements and bodies sounds: sampled live to the soundtrack of an intangible world.